Return of the Valkyrie

Not a bad wrapup to a really awesome trilogy of episodes! This episode didn't do quite as much for me as the first two, mainly because Xena and Gabrielle did nothing on their own - Beowulf was the main person moving the plot along - but it was still a darned decent show.

Shades of the episode Chakram: Xena has no memory of her violent past. This time she has no memory at all, apparently including that she woke up wearing armor and in the middle of a battleground.

Years are dropping like flies! Another one hits the dust. Everyone around Xena and Gabrielle have now aged 2*6* years since they saw Xena and Gab last. And all of Xena's past misdeeds are now 36 years ago.

Beowulf's past year: Beowulf did a pretty remarkable recovery from that fatal gut wound. He acquired a little buddy named Wiglaf, and has apparently just been hanging around Gabrielle's fire for the past year. His burned hand shows he, at least once, convinced himself that just maybe HE's Gabrielle's soulmate and could reach her. That must have been a scene to see. Beowulf had also given up Xena for dead again. Silly boy.

Grinnhilda's past year: Grinnhilda has apparently named herself Guardian of the Ring - she beats the crap out of anyone who comes around. Which kind of makes sense since it was attempts to protect the ring that got her in this mess in the first place.

Xena's past year: Xena somehow got from battlefield all the way across Germany and the Baltic Sea (?) to end up washed ashore in Denmark and Hrothgar's kingdom. Hrothgar adopts the poor little lost buxom beauty, gives her a name, and sets her up to be a pet wife. The pet wife has some vague ideas about helping the people around her, some disquieting feelings that she's forgetting something, but generally goes along with the plan.

Gabrielle's past year: Zzzzzzz.

Brunnhilda's past year: Crackle, sizzle.

Literature lesson time again: Wiglaf and Hrothgar are both traditionally a part of the Beowulf story. Wiglaf seems pretty unchanged, as a young sidekick for Beowulf. Hrothgar is wildly different, though: in the classic tale, it's his land that's being ravaged by Grendel. Xena has progressed from Alberech, the maker of the ring, to Siegfried, the fearless hero who awakens the woman sleeping within the fire (who, according to Wagner, is Brunnhilda). Wagner's story ends less happily, though. The Rheinmaidens end up with the ring returned, but Siegfried dies and all of Valhalla is destroyed with... get this... the Twilight of the Gods. Familiar term!

NASTY, gruesome effect when Grinnhilda rips the arms off the warrior. Ewww!

The Viking priest/whatever starts the marriage ceremony by saying it will be a ritual of exchanging of blades... except then they just exchange rings and no blades. What's up with dat?

Xena disses Hrothgar BIG time with her duck of his bridal smooch to just give him a hug. There's a big sign that the marriage is doomed.

The valkyries bemoan the loss of the great viking warriors Sven, Ingmar, and John Thomas. Which of those names doesn't belong?

Very sick - and very funny - humor as the valkyries methodically pick through the dead bodies as they talk. I nearly lost it when pschoValkyrie dropped a dead warrior like a sack of potatoes.

Did Beowulf and Hrothgar's sister plan that surprise arrival at Xena's door? Or did Beowulf just make use of the sister's treachery? Either works perfectly well, but I'm curious.

Xena asks what's wrong with the sailors on the boat and says that they look as though they've seen a ghost. My first thought was that they looked like they had just seen a babe where they least expected one. And what a babe - that white fur look was incredible! I wonder if Xena kept that outfit around in whatever magic bag holds all of Xena and Gabrielle's changes of clothing?

Wiglaf seems like a nice enough guy, but was he putting the moves on Xena when he offered her water? ("Carry your books for you, Xena? Buy you a milkshake?") Keep dreaming, kid!

Another great XenaVerse tweak: the legendary violence of the Vikings is because of evilXena's love of warfare. Her influence on Odin and the Valkyries didn't surprise me that much, but I liked that touch!

The valkyrie's flying horses land on the beach... and continue on with a long trail of horseprints behind them. Whoops!

By my count of both seen and heard swings, psychoValkyrie tried 12 times to kill Xena... and at the end Xena's standing healthy and barely winded. That should have been a clanging bell warning to psychoValkyrie that she was sorely outmatched.

I loved the delivery on Xena's line "I don't know you from your horse." But it brings up a good point - what the hell did Odin need a horse for? Odin was totally incomprehensible this episode. He lets Xena live so he can get the ring from her after she gets it from the fire. But then when the big moment comes and Xena claims the ring, Odin is apparently piddling around in Valhalla. And when Xena finally shows up there to remind him about that little ring he was obsessing about, he caves in to her like a house of cards. What a loser character.

And while we're on strange acts of the gods, psychoValkyrie says that Odin can't take the ring, because he loves her, and will give her the ring... who has forsaken love. What kind of deal is that? Even if he DID love her, why would he give her the thing that would ensure she'd never love him - not to mention be able to kick his butt? PsychoValkyrie's none too swift.

Big-time dialog blooper: Beowulf says that "*Grinnhilda's* flame will recognize Xena as Gabrielle's soulmate." I listened to it about six times, thinking that he surely said BRUNNhilda, but it was GRINNhilda. Whoops!

What do stunties wear under their dresses? According to the one who does the Xenaflips during the fight outside the Brunnfire, they wear tan bicycle shorts.

Once again in the big final fight, an unarmed and not- really-fighting Xena keeps psychoValkyrie at bay easily... and psychoValkyrie calls her "soft"?! Was she in the same fight we were watching?

Wiglaf takes a dagger through the gut very much like Beowulf's earlier sword stab. He should pick some better ways to follow in Beowulf's footsteps.

Beowulf really kicks butt in that last fight. He does well with the sword-swinging, and then he gets his hands on that big axe, and all bets are REALLY off.

Line of the episode goes right to Xena without even trying for "Wait longer!" Yah!

The shot of Beowulf being raised in the air to Grinnhilda's face by her claw like a meathook is in the "so-much-homage- it's-almost-copyright-infringement" category. I thought for a moment that my tv had inexplicably switched to a station playing Aliens. Good thing that Beowulf's injury wasn't quite as devastating as Bishop's was.

Xena: Warrior Princess Charming. The kiss was just as sweet as could be. And the "sub" part of subtext is still nowhere to be seen.

For the really obsessive like I apparently am, the flashbacks during the kiss are:

• Two shots of the end of Sins of the Past, the very first episode of the first season
• The comfort scene after the big fight in Between the Lines, fourth season, when this whole "soulmates forever connected" idea was really solidified
• The end of The Abyss when Xena is complaining about the condition of her sword, three episodes ago
• And then back to Sins of the Past again

Xena was able to tell that the monster she killed last episode wasn't Grinnhilda because it still had all its fingers and she chopped one of Grinnhilda's off. But when Grinnhilda clutches Xena to squeeze her, she seems to have all her fingers.

I could buy that since Xena made the ring, she could unmake it. But the writers totally lost me on how Grinnhilda's forgiveness did the unmaking. The ring changed Grinnhilda and destroyed Xena's memory. Xena's memory was already restored, even though the ring was still intact. But Grinnhilda's forgiveness, which had nothing to do with the ring at all, seemed to unmake it. And the ring's destruction SEEMED to also heal Beowulf and Wiglaf's wounds. I gave up on making any sense out of that whatsoever.

When we return to outside the cave, Beowulf and Gabrielle seem to have already had a conversation. I would have liked to have listened in on that; what do you say to someone whose body you've been guarding for a year? Wiglaf seems to have a very appropriate "You've been watching the love of your life for a year and now you're just going to let her walk away?" reaction when Beowulf bids them goodbye. Bummer for Beowulf.

Brunnhilda (or what's left of her) tells Gabrielle "God speed" when Gab thanks her. Which is a very nice moment and a sweet sentiment, but since when does a Norse valkyrie from Odin's pantheon have any concept of "God"?

The flying horse effect in this episode was really reminding me of Harry Hamlin on Pegasus in Clash of the Titans. They were using the same trick of putting sky behind footage of a running horse, and of showing people rocking back and forth on a sky background as if they had a running horse beneath them.

The Gabrielle arc of episodes ends with a shot of her smiling face. This trilogy was amazing for how much it hinged on the bard. Xena was still the primary protagonist and the hero (while she had her memory, anyway), but most things happened because of Gabrielle, especially in the last two episodes. But even with that, Gabrielle slept through most of an episode. That's a mixed bag of blessings for Renee O'Connor.

Return to the Wool-Gatherings.

	Web www.bethgriese.com